Manchester mayor Andy Burnham has again shown Labour leader Keir Starmer what effective opposition looks like, with a demand for Boris Johnson to include schools in his new England-wide lockdown.
Burnham tweeted today from his official Twitter account:
I remain of the view the circuit break should be a true circuit break so we can reset things and get a proper grip of the virus.
We do need to see a period of closure of schools. I would suggest a period of two weeks, towards the second half of November.
Starmer, meanwhile, continues to insist schools must remain open, a month to the day after warning that they will fuel the second wave of the pandemic – and in spite of figures showing that they are responsible for almost ten times as many infections as the hospitality sector Boris Johnson is about to close.
This is the second time in less than two weeks that Burnham’s leadership has exposed Starmer’s lack of it. Burnham’s example then on Johnson’s ‘Tier 3’ scam stung Starmer into his first act of anything like genuine opposition. Will it do the same now?
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A sensible move.
Schools should be closed NOW. The lack of sunlight suits the virus. The cold encourages people to congregate indoors. Johnson Cummings Harding’s sinfully catastrophic Don’t Test Don’ Trace, makes open schools throbbing petri dishes.
This is what Starmer said this morning on Marr (direct quote), whilst I acknowledge that you may disagree with him on whether the risk is manageable or not there is little doubt that you both agree (me too) on the critical importance of an efficient and effective testing and trace regime.
“Schools must stay open. It’s really important. The harm that children are caused by not being in school is huge, so they must stay open, but we’ve got to manage the risk. What I said to the Prime Minister in September was, what you should do is elevate if you like children and staff and teachers to the status of NHS staff and that means having mass targeted testing at schools on a weekly basis. The government didn’t put any precaution around schools. If you want your schools to be open and we should you’ve got to manage that risk”
SH it is obvious that schools should be closed NOW. children have always been vectors of infections. asymptotic. all the better to infect every one they encounter. we r yet to fully understand covid-19 and johnson’s cumming’s dodo & your sir starmer ALL appear to neither want to save lives nor prevent distress, judging by their actions and inactions. SH it is clear.
My gut feeling (you may be surprised to hear) is to agree with you, particularly for older pupils who besides apparently being the major spreaders in the school population are more likely to be able to look after themselves at home. Unfortunately like most of us I don’t have access to all the information/advise and I have no training as a epidemiologist. It is really unfortunate that Boris ignored Labour’s pleadings (probably because of his vulnerable ego) and wasted the opportunity of the ½ term holiday.
It is not just the Tories opening up of schools it is the sheer incompetence of the way they have managed it. They just didn’t have a plan, what were they doing all through the spring and summer when they were repeatedly rejecting Labour’s offers of help with bold (fantasy) reassurances that they had everything in hand.
But Starmer knows that isn’t going to happen. Does Starmer just want to send kids back to prove the point what we already know regardless of the dangers. What an asshole. Johnson has repeatedly failed to track and trace properly and he knows it won’t be fixed by the Tories. Now or in the future.
Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Burnham has stepped up. As I said in a recent post (below) an unlikely hero. But I’ve put aside all my past misgivings about Burnham. A breath of fresh air, and showing Starmer the way indeed. If only he could show him the door, and boot his nasty self-serving arse through it.
https://lovesexwomenmenpoliticspoetrylifedeath.wordpress.com/2020/10/18/andy-burnham-an-unlikely-hero/
George Galloway’s statement that the election of Starmer as leader of the Labour party would be the end of Labour as mass movement of the working class has already proven to be accurate.
Unfortunately this seems to have already happened prior to Starmer’s leadership. For the first time ever at the 2019GE more C2DE voted Tory than voted Labour (and by a substantial margin). For context an equal percentages of ABC1 (33%) voted Tory and Labour. It is a sad state of affairs that the ‘working class’ gave Johnson his 80 seat majority.
Because TOTALLY due to Brexit. Check the election map. Jeremy tried to appease Mr Remain – YOUR – SIR Keith Rodney Starmer. FACT🔴🔴🔴
Like it or not Corbyn was ‘appeasing (rather badly) the vast majority of the Labour Party’s membership.
The larger membership was lied to by YOUR sir keith rodney starmer
Were they ?
Yes.
windchimes – I had been expecting a rather more comprehensive and detailed reply, however if that’s really the best you can manage then I guess I’ll have accept that and draw my own conclusions.
yes
🥱
Credit to Andy. But let’s be honest, even the most bourgeose liberal politician on the planet (excluding maybe Neil Hamilton and Nigel Farage) would make our billionaire-backed leader look, well, ineffective and acquiescent to the billionaires (the 0.0001%).
qwertboi, a carrot on a stick, a hooray henry, a braying sloan ranger, a slug on a turd, woodlice, barnacles ALL make starmer look ineffective and acquiescent even to millionaires, never mind billionaires.
AB was the only candidate I spoke to in 2016 leadership election, he is human, a decent enough bloke but never got the feeling he was a conviction politician
No idea what his Red lines are or what he would go to war for, or if he is on the right or left of the party
I recall that this was the major criticism that was levelled at him in the 2015 leadership election.
Doug, the thing about Burnham, when he won the Manchester Mayoralty, Jeremy took a train up to celebrate with him. He snubbed Jeremy. Other MPs did it too. They won on the coat tails of Jeremy and slapped him in the face. Neil Coyle is similar. Those are dreadful people. After Burnham’s charade last week he PROMPTLY grovelled to BloJob. It would be in the public domain somewhere. Burnham is like the others. All content with the status quo.
These days are a litmus test. Take note of all who stand up and OUR and unequivocally CONDEMN sir keith starmer for his gross dishonesty and unjust actions to Jeremy. Take note and KEEP note. Vital to help you identify those with WORTHWHILE integrity.
Fair weather “friends” are to be despised. You cannot SUSTAIN a WORTHWHILE government with those🌹🌹🌹
You are 100% right Signposts – well said
Yes, decent-ish, but SnotW ireminded me below how despite winning the mayorality on the back of JC’s popularity, he snubbed Jeremy very publically.
Funny thing is, when he was a PLP MP, people referred to him as “Noddy” and I never saw it, but the pic that Skwawkie SW has put up above is 100% Noddy in Toyland. He might be protecting the people of Manchester well, and look good compared to Boris and Sir Trilat Bill, but Andy Burnham IS pure Enid Blyton.
To be fair Andy Burnham stood very much on his own platform.
qwertboi, we both love Janáček and i think we r as one mind with Burnham. I really felt for Jeremy that evening. Just typing it and i’m welling up. What sort of people do that? How does it help us to trust these people? We can disagree on how to achieve aims. But we must never compromise on integrity, ESPECIALLY when the lack of it is openly displayed as Burnham and all the others did. Why did he do that? Why? Totally uncalled for unless he was fully in the plot č Twatson, Hodge, Phillips x2, Lammy, Arsetair & Arseworth etc
I’ll tell u something else. Why the failure to develop new people? Why the fixation on so called “big names”? Think of it. The Tories, undisputedly good at winning elections, other than BloJob, in my life time, none of their leaders started as “big names”. I may be very wrong. So put me right. Look at Kenneth Clarke. He is a big name PLUS very human. They did not choose him and they won!!!
Look at Jeremy, i never knew of him and yet as soon as i heard him at the leadership elections, i thought those are the BELIEFS i share. Like 500,000 others i joined SPECIFICALLY because of his beliefs. So we must DUMP the fixation of big names.
The 1st time i heard Zara Sultana (excuse spelling) i was thoroughly impressed. Again i thought, THAT is someone i could support. That’s after listening to her speak during a standing room only event. To me she outshone ALL the well known, much older and esteemed people there (one world famous).
We must seek out the unknown. Develop the unknown who must practice speaking up. Practise being PREPARED for hostilities. Get ready for humans as we are. Focus on tangible basic needs of people here. People in the main do not give a toss about words and meanings when it comes to political activist having the most turgid arguments disconnected to their immediate concerns.
Just as few may give a toss about where the accent in a Czech composer’s name lies or how much we love The Cunning Little Vixen. You and i may care, but it is not vital or immediately tangible to the lives of others.
Tell people every day and show pictures of olive vines tended for hundreds of years PULLED UP and TRASHED. Tell people of homes bulldozed and lands seized. Tell of the daily maiming and killing of people, then i guarantee, the electorate here will take notice.
The idea of persisting for decades arguing about words and meanings and history, when violent abuses are happening NOW, is patently absurd. But it is one of those loops of frustration and or displacement indulgence. Tell me when last anyone saw an exposition of the actual injustices, the OBSCENE ABUSE described above of the Palestinians or any other abused people???
Tell me, even here on Skwawkbox.org tell me any discussion of the daily suffering of the Palestinians or other people??? I’v glimpsed lots of interminable arguments about “words and meanings”. Funny that. “There is nothing new under the sun.”
Funny, too i’ve gone off on one again😂😂😂 … when i should be doing other things. And i talk about discipline. Need to follow my own advice.
But, we are complicated beings, us humans. Though, better than being a close to amoebic creature like WMD Blair. Uncomplicated functions and appetites – greed for tons of money – craving … courting rich kleptocratic despots – sucking deep up any moneyed or warmongering ani like George Bush.
I remember the single image of a dead migrant toddler washed up on the beach in the Med. Even the Daiy Mail had to write about how politicians needed more compassion after a public outcry. It lasted a week then they switched back to racist anti migrant rhetoric. I think you have a point. When people are confronted, truly confronted by the horror of war and misery of the lives of others, most normal people, even Tory voters start to listen and pay more attention. But we must hold that attention with those images and stories.
the problem is, yet again, the mainstream media. They stopped showing poverty, war, homelessness, desperation actually as it happens with context. Where once this used to make arresting stories, now its politically inconvenient to the establishment and its all but vanished from our press.
M, It is WE who must keep things in the press and the media. I listen to radio only and read. If i say our so called “Left” MPs have failed in that regard, take it as gospel. When last did you hear ANY of them even mention Grenfel. U would think the victims are sorted. They have not!
It is OUR lot who must turn up and speak up.
Just read on skwawkbox this very day good hearted, knowledgable, inteligent, sincere people going on about history and fetishising about their desperation of using words relevant to them. Words with which only they are obsessed. Not one substantial exposition of the real suffering of real people TODAY abroad and right here.
M, it is a relief to hear someone who recognises that people are not theories and and debates about history and words you never hear on the high street for good reason. The arguments are academic displacement self-indulgence. The task SEEMS difficult so lets fight over words.
What does it matter if a Zoroastrian shafts you or a Treki, or a levitating Tibetan transgender nun??? Are you not still shafted??? People are exploited all over the planet by every permutation and combination of people. To expend energy on a peculiar fixation while people suffer is like having a fight over the name of a life boat rather than making haste to save a drowning child.
M, I’v gone off on one again! I always intend one paragraph, max two. Tis just that so many things seem obvious to me and i do get upset at the state of things… causes my thoughts to tumble out.
M, the media has always self-censored on showing the effects of munitions on the human body.
If civilians saw dogs eating the intestines of identifiable soldiers – or those of little children – I suspect they would reject all foreign adventures and teach their children never to go to war except in defence of direct attacks on home soil.
The reason we’re never shown such images is to protect imperialist governments from us, not to protect our delicate sensibilities.
Would anyone defend Blair after seeing in close-up thousands of dead and dismembered Iraqi children laid out for relatives to try to identify their own?
For some time the MSM have fed the great us on a regular diet of Poverty/Benefit Porn to firmly plant the message that we could all become ‘one of them’ if we don’t tow the line. By and large the great British public have lapped up this divisive nonsense
Perhaps now so many have and will be subjected to the miseries and realities of UC there might be a change in in the public concious.
correction – have fed
the greatusAlso RH the word you should have used it ‘toe the line’ as in the start of the a race. Tow of course means to pull someone/ something towards /away.
Norma – Thanks for your help, however in the same spirit it would be remiss of me not to point out that RH doesn’t appear to have posted on this page and for some unfathomable reason you appear to have confused me with him. Also you should have used ‘phrase’ instead of ‘word’.
I told you he probably wouldn’t fall into your trap Norma.
He was almost certain to notice you’d addressed him by his alternate persona.
Good try though 😉
David – I’m surprised by your willingness to proudly declare your own stupidity.